What new trends are crypto VCs currently researching?
TechFlow Selected TechFlow Selected
What new trends are crypto VCs currently researching?
What views are reflected in recent articles by a16z, IOSG, Coinbase, and Paradigm?
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insights
Author: Beichen
The latest developments in the crypto market can certainly be captured on social media, but the cost of filtering information is simply too high. Social platforms are always full of noise, causing us to intermittently lose hearing or focus, mistaking personal biases for consensus. A good way to overcome this is to identify high-quality information sources and assign them higher confidence levels as our reference materials.
Any valuable insight, perspective, or experience takes time to form; reading them is like leveraging time for ourselves.
Chain Tea House plans to continuously track in-depth research from top-tier crypto investment firms and independent analysts, curating and integrating these insights on a regular (weekly) basis into systematic outputs, aiming to serve as a reference for readers observing undercurrents in the industry.
Below is our first somewhat immature attempt. We will continue improving both our source-tracking database and output model, and welcome recommendations from readers about information sources you find highly trustworthy.
a16z "In Defense of Stablecoins" — Miles Jennings
This article responds to external criticism against stablecoins.
It explains that the collapse of algorithmic stablecoins was not due to flaws in their algorithms, but rather financial shortcomings—specifically, insufficient collateral.
More precisely, algorithmic stablecoins rely on "endogenous" collateral—the project's governance token. When the governance token drops in value, it triggers a death spiral where collateral is liquidated to redeem assets, similar to a traditional bank run.
In contrast, decentralized stablecoins like DAI, which are over-collateralized with cryptocurrencies, can fully withstand extreme market conditions. Terra’s USDT, however, should not be considered a stablecoin (the reason is not explained).
The final conclusion is: Regulation is necessary, but stablecoins should not be banned—especially decentralized stablecoins, which are more resilient. Moreover, algorithmic stablecoins offer potential to make various assets productive and advance global digital commerce, but safeguards must be put in place regarding their collateral.
a16z "Why NFT Creators Should Go cc0" — Flashrekt, Scott Duke Kominers
We're familiar with exclusive IP strategies, but if there were an open-source mindset—explicitly allowing the public to build upon existing technology (or fork and copy)—it could actually increase the value of intellectual property. Thus, NFT communities embracing open-source principles may go further.
Cc0 (Creative Commons Zero) is a nonprofit initiative enabling creators to intentionally waive all rights, allowing anyone to create derivative works and profit from them.
Now, many NFT projects have adopted cc0, and numerous crypto artists are adding their work to it—to encourage expansion of the original project and foster a more vibrant and engaged community. The most prominent example is the Loot series, which joined cc0 to reduce licensing friction.
However, cc0 mainly applies to emerging projects. Established brands (like Disney) building NFTs tend to prefer more restrictive licenses.
The conclusion is: The NFT space needs open-source communities, and cc0 aims to become the infrastructure enabling this.
IOSG "Dissecting the Data Availability Layer: The Overlooked Lego Block in a Modular Future" — Jiawei
The core argument of the article is that modular blockchains will become the key narrative in the next cycle (over the next 3–5 years), with each layer being loosely coupled.
Among them, the execution layer, dominated by rollups, has already been divided among major players, leaving little room for newcomers.
The competitive landscape of the consensus layer (i.e., each Layer 1) remains unsettled. New Layer 1s such as Aptos and Sui are emerging, but their narratives feel like old wine in new bottles, making it difficult to identify compelling investment opportunities.
The data availability layer, however, still holds untapped value—for instance, using blockchains as trust anchors to guarantee off-chain data availability.
Coinbase "Is Bitcoin’s Lightning Network Real?" — Connor Dempsey & Sam Newman
Bitcoin processes only seven transactions per second and has high fees, making it impractical for everyday payments. However, its Layer 2 solution—the Lightning Network—can handle millions of instant transactions per second at a cost of just a few cents. This incentivizes users to deposit BTC into the Lightning Network for transactions and could even impact the global remittance market.
The Lightning protocol sits atop Bitcoin. Above the Lightning protocol lies core infrastructure, and above that, an increasing number of service-oriented DApps for payments, finance, consumption, and more.
Over the past six months, the user base and ecosystem of Bitcoin’s Lightning Network have steadily grown—particularly in El Salvador, where 5% of transactions now use BTC.
The final assessment is: If a bull market returns and gas fees rise, activity on the Lightning Network will surge.
Paradigm "Cosmos Without Tendermint" — Joachim Neu, Andrew Kirillov, Georgios Konstantopoulos
Cosmos’ high-performance BFT consensus toolkit enables developers to launch chains directly on Tendermint. However, Tendermint was conceived years ago and may now have better alternatives.
Paradigm proposes a new approach—replacing Tendermint with Narwhal & Bullshark (N/B)—while maintaining compatibility with the Cosmos SDK stack.
To demonstrate this, they built a prototype Cosmos/ABCI application using Narwhal/Bullshark as the consensus engine instead of Tendermint. The test results showed that: although ABCI aims to be more generic, it is largely customized around Tendermint and thus less suitable for newer consensus protocols.
Join TechFlow official community to stay tuned
Telegram:https://t.me/TechFlowDaily
X (Twitter):https://x.com/TechFlowPost
X (Twitter) EN:https://x.com/BlockFlow_News
